Thursday, December 6, 2012

Monday evening in Atlanta and I was craving kushiyaki, more
specifically chicken skin kushiyaki. Ah, chicken skin, the oh so maligned part
of the chicken anatomy that ranks near the oyster as my favorite. To think of
the countess Americans that buy boneless skinless chicken breast and deprive
themselves of that hard earned flavor, but I digress. Unfortunately, both
Jennifer and I’s favorite Atlanta kushiyaki vendor, Shoya Izakaya, is closed on Mondays
and with our last visit to Miso Izakaya ending lukewarm at best, we were at a
loss about where to go. Through either a stroke of fortuitous googling or a
sudden jolt of memory, Jennifer told me to look up Yakitori Jinbei. Quickly
concurring, we were soon on our way to Smyrna and the little strip mall that
Yakitori Jinbei calls home.

As is the case with Jennifer and I at nearly any Asian meal,
this one began with a few dumplings.

Served five to an order, these were sizeable albeit pricy gyoza.

A delightful starchy char on the bottom is always a welcome sight.
With a big, juicy pork, scallion, and ginger filling, the gyoza were simple yet
satisfying.

Before the first dumpling was finished, the first round of
kushiyaki arrived.

Coated in sweet and smoky tare, this yakitori and negima
looked the part.

By itself, the chicken yakitori was little more than juicy
thigh meat with a lacquered layer of tare. Surprisingly closer to underdone
than over, this yakitori ticked the right boxes.

This was the first time I had seen chicken and green onion
labeled as negima kushiyaki,

but even with a deeply charred onion, there was a welcome
green punch to the sweetness and char of the chicken.

Following the lead of the myriad Atlanta food bloggers
before me, I made sure to order the tonkotsu ramen.

I may have read recipes and descriptions, but I wasn’t quite
prepared for what was brought to me. Topped with sesame seeds, roasted pork, bamboo shoots, and seaweed, this pork bone ramen was a fat
speckled, silky epiphany.

I may be treading dangerously close (or jumping headfirst) to hyperbole, but
this was a new benchmark in soup. The
noodles were just the right amount of chewy, the broth was fatty and creamy, so
very creamy, and the texture was nigh impossible to resist. In fact the only
oddity to the dish was the roasted pork.

While the pork was undeniably sweet and nutty, I couldn’t
figure out why it was served cold on top of a piping hot bowl of ramen broth.

As sinful as the tonkotsu ramen may have been, kushiyaki
waits for no man.
Featuring of a fair chunk of Yakitori Jinbei’s yakitori menu, this plate was loaded
with all manner of binchotan grilled and tare glazed treats.

Though I’ll sometimes see beef tongue on a yakitori menu,
this was my first time seeing gyukushi.

Which cut of beef is gyukushi? I’m still not quite sure.

However, after one bite, the cut was inconsequential. These
were thick slabs of mercilessly overcooked beef that were frankly a waste of
good meat regardless of how much tare was applied.

Next in line was a chicken meatball or tsukune.

Much like the yakitori and negima, this chicken skewer was
well seared and quite juicy with a meaty texture.

In contrast to the chicken meatball was the shiitake
awaseyaki or chicken stuffed shiitake.

The meat had a more uneven and handmade look to it, but I
couldn’t help but wonder were the mushroom was.

Comically small, the flavor of the mushroom in the skewer was subtle at best
especially when compared to the dense flavor and texture of the chicken
stuffing.

Always on the hunt for well cooked liver, I had high hopes
for the chicken liver or tori liver.
Sadly, like the gyukushi beef, no amount of tare could mask the horrendous
taste and texture of this liver. As best I can describe, this liver tasted like
the cardboard textured gum you would get in baseball cards in the early 90s but
dipped in tare.

Grasping for fatty salvation, I moved on to the chicken skin
or torikawa.
Lacking the sublime crunch of the Shoya Izakaya version, this chicken skin
kushiyaki wasn’t quite up to par.
That being said, there was still an ample amount of that crunchy, crispy edge
and fatty interior that has made this one of my favorite kushiyaki skewers. If
only every skewer could balance crisp edges, rich chicken flavor, and a heavy
tare sweetness this well.

Standing on its own as the lone cephalopod, the squid or
ikakushi was an interesting choice.
Large, chewy, and meaty, this squid wasn’t too shabby.

Nearing the end, the butabara pork was one of two skewers
that I ordered salt only.
Was skipping the tare a good choice with the butabara? If you don’t enjoy the
simple flavor of pork then no tare was a poor choice, but for me, I was
delighted by the lightly charred pork as it was porky, moist, and packed just
the right level of salinity.

To wrap things up, the final skewer out of the Yakitori
Jinbei kitchen was a grilled shrimp or ebikushi.
Sticking to the salt only ending, this shrimp had a well charred and very salty
shell. As for the inside, it may have had a decent flavor but there was no
denying it was completely overcooked.

If there was anything I could take away from the first meal
at Yakitori Jinbei, it’s that the title of 2010 best ramen in Atlanta from
Creative Loafing was more than deserved. For this to be my first proper bowl of
tonkotsu ramen, I fear that I may have started down a long path of obsession
and my bite of shoyu ramen was no slouch either. Sadly, as I could gush for
paragraph after paragraph about the tonkotsu ramen, it was more of a mixed bag
with the kushiyaki. While every skewer involving chicken, save the liver,
was exemplary, the poor textures of the liver, beef, and shrimp squandered nearly
every bit of goodwill the chicken had earned. What it comes down to is that I
would, without hesitation, drive across town and maybe even across a state or
two for more of that tonkotsu ramen, but the kushiyaki is a different story.